Arms and the Girl
by CharlesTheBold
Summary: Joan has been assigned the ILIAD in English class, and thanks to an assist from God, she's really into it. Please Review
1. Chapter 1

**Arms and the Girl**

_(Disclaimer: I have no business connection with JOAN OF ARCADIA. My only purpose in writing this story is to have fun and maybe share it)_

_(This story is part of a series I'm writing, in which God visits Joan's bookstore and causes her to enter the stories of various books. The previous two stories are KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL and THE CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY.)_

_Thersites' body is as good as Ajax's, when neither are alive__._

- Shakespeare, Cymbeline

"The _Iliad_!" complained Grace. "Why do we have to read the _Iliad_?"

"So what's wrong with the _Iliad_?" asked Joan. "At least it's stood the test of time. It's not like the teacher assigned the most recent best-seller to impress the students."

"It's about WAR," said Grace.

"The Trojan War."

"Does that make it better? People are always trying to beautify war. Shakespeare considered the civil war in the 1400s the greatest disaster in English history, but what do history books call it? The War of the Roses. Nice pretty flowers."

"I think it's good that kids are encouraged to admire the ancient Greeks," said Luke. "Though I'd rather hear about the great thinkers – Euclid and Aristotle. And even I wouldn't want to read hundreds of pages of mathematical proofs all ending in QED. "

"I think the important thing about Homer is that he was the FIRST," said Joan.

"Unless the Bible is older," mused Luke. "Grace?"

Grace shrugged. "I'm studying the Torah for my Bat Mitzvah next year, but I'm not going to get in arguments about whether it was written by Moses or some other guys hundreds of years later."

"Not going to get in arguments? That's rare!" Joan couldn't resist saying that at the moment, but she regretted it a second later, as it looked like Grace was about to flare up.

"Isn't the Torah supposed to have been written by God?" said a voice behind Joan.

Joan turned around to see an old lady standing by the shelves. Joan had not seen her come in, and suspected that she hadn't; for this was Old Lady God. At least her appearance quieted Grace down. Even if she was mad at Joan, she was not going to embarrass Joan in front of a customer.

"We had better clear out; Joan has business to do," suggested Luke. He and Grace slipped out, and Joan went to the counter to handle the Old Lady's purchase.

"So, who's right?" asked Joan. "You're omniscient."

"Ah, but I'm not going to intervene in a harmless disagreement. Having opinions is fine, as long as they are reasonable and do no harm. Just make sure that you have the facts." She accepted the receipt and left with a wave.

Joan went back to her table and opened her own copy of the Iliad.

_Sing, o Muse, of the Wrath of Achilles—_

Maybe Grace was right. There were a lot cooler things to sing about—

Joan bent her head over the epic. Then it got lower and lower, until she finally fell asleep with her nose in the book.

0-0-0-0-0

Joan found herself on a dusty plain; to her left the sun was setting. She could smell salt water; she must be near a shore of some sort, but something unpleasant was mixed in with the smell.

She saw pieces of wood, though nothing technological, scattered along the ground. Looking around, she noticed what looked like a corral, with horses. Joan was not particularly fond of horses, but it looked like the most coherent thing in sight, so she walked in that direction. At the back of her mind was the notion _This is a divine mission, so there must be a meaning here._

She reached the corral, and noticed that even it had signs of decay. As if the builder hadn't intended it to stay up for this long. One of the horses trotted up to the fence, and Joan shyly raised her hand to pet it.

"What are you doing?" bellowed a voice behind her.

She turned around to see a huge, ugly guy walk up to her. His size reminded her of the being she called Tough Guy God, except that with Tough Guy you could detect the divine spirit inside him somehow, and with the newcomer she felt nothing but nastiness.

"Just petting a horse," she said. "I thought he was cute."

The newcomer looked as if _cute_ was not in his vocabulary. "Are you sure you weren't planning to hop on a horse and get away?"

Joan didn't know how to ride; her experience was limited to pony rides when she was many years younger. But _get away. _ Had God put her into another story about slavery, as He had put her into UNCLE TOM'S CABIN a few weeks earlier. But this guy's outfit - a rough leather jacket and some metal hanging down over his thighs – didn't look anything like Civil War fashions. "No – I –"

"What's your name?"

"Ioanna". She had intended to say "Joan", but it hadn't come out that way.

"You're coming with me." He grasped her arm and pulled her away from the corral. Joan didn't struggle. She knew that this was a vision from God and that the deity wouldn't let anything happen to her.

After a few minutes she saw a set of huts and tents, and behind them, some ships floating offshore. The huts were as crudely built as the corral, but Joan was starting to make sense of things now. This was a camp, something not intended to last, but for some reason it was being forced to last far longer than its builders had planned.

The Big Guy walked up to a small windowless hut. "Thersites!"

The door of the hut opened, and a man came out. He was also ugly, but in a completely different way. He was scrawny, and bald, and there was something odd in his proportions. "Yes, Lord Ajax?"

Joan was tempted to giggle. The Big Guy had the same name as a detergent! Then she sobered up as she considered the implication of the names. They sounded familiar… In front of her copy of the _Iliad_, there was a list of the characters, starting with the Greek heroes. Agamemnon, Menelaus, Odysseus, Diomedes, _Ajax_! And she thought she might have seen the name Thersites further down the list.

God had thrown her into the _Iliad_.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

_(Author's Note: the title is a parody of the opening line of Virgil's AENEAD: "I sing of Arms and a Man from Troy". Shaw used it for a satirical play, ARMS AND THE MAN)_


	2. Chapter 2

**Arms and the Girl**

**Chapter 2 The Trojan Women**

"Into the hut with you, wench," ordered Ajax. "Not you, Thersites, I have orders for you."

"Wench" was rude, but Joan saw little point in getting mad at an imaginary personage in a vision or dream, so she went in the hut. As she entered she heard the door shut, followed by a rattling sound. She was locked in.

Like everything else she had seen in the camp, the hut was crude. One big windowless room. There was a hole in the roof, which let in a little air and light. No furniture; there were several girls lying or sitting down on straw. One started as Joan entered.

"Oh! I thought it was that awful Thersites. I'm sure that he wants to molest us."

"No danger of that, Cressida," said another girl. "He's a eunuch."

Joan started. "Eunuch" was not a word used very often by twenty-first century girls, but she knew what it meant, and it had some unpleasant relevance with her life.

Her brother Kevin had suffered a terrible automobile accident recently, which had left him partially paralyzed. It had taken a long time to determine just how bad off he was. What worried Joan in particular, and which would be awkward to ask about because she was his sister, was whether Kevin was still capable of sexual relations. Kevin had finally hinted to the family that he was, though he was reticent about explaining how he knew.

Kevin's potential problem was due to an accident. Thersites' problem was probably not. Somebody had mutilated him, as revenge or a punishment – and the girls here took that horrible act for granted, and even found it a relief.

"The people you have to worry about, Cressida, are the Greek leaders. Thersites is ordered to protect us from the rank and file. But Bryseis, there, has been claimed by Achilles."

Claimed. These girls were slaves, to be divided up like other property. And Joan was horrified to realize that she was one of them.

Joan told herself that this was a dream. These were not real girls. But were they based on real girls, in real circumstances?

"He's not really that interested in girls," said Bryseis. "His favorite is one of his fellow soldiers, named Patroclus. But by claiming me, he kept the other heroes away, and I'm grateful to him for that."

The other girls were very interested in that morsel of gossip.

"Maybe he's more girly than he seems," said another girl. "I read that when the war broke out, he disguised himself as a girl to avoid having to report to duty."

"That's right," said still another. "The king of Skyros let him hide among his daughters. Odysseus exposed him by placing a sword near the woman and watching to see which 'girl' seemed most interested in it."

"The odd thing," another said, "is that Odysseus himself didn't want to get in the war either, originally. He pretended to go insane, but the others saw through it."

"I don't understand," Cressida said angrily. "If they don't want to be here, why don't they go home? We would have defeated the others long ago, with Odysseus and Achilles gone. And we could live our own lives in Troy. I had a boyfriend there, Troilus. We might have been married."

_Might have been._ If she got back to Troy, could she still marry Troilus. Or would he dismiss her as damaged goods? If so, losing Troilus wouldn't be much of a loss in Joan's opinion.

"Somehow," said Bryseis, "it's all for Helen."

A noise outside, unlocking the door, and Thersites entered. "Come out, all of you. The nobles are having a conference, and they want all the girls present."

"Why?" asked Cressida, but she and the others filed out without waiting for an answer. Joan trailed behind them, not because she wanted to obey the "nobles" but because it seemed clear that something important was likely to happen at the conference.

"Dunno," said Thersites, "and duncare. All the argument is a cuckold and a whore."

_He's talking about Helen of Troy_, Joan realized. _The face that launched a thousand ships. Being a eunuch must make the thought of sex very frustrating for him. And besides, I suppose he's right._

Thersites took them to a large tent, almost a pavilion. There were a number of soldiers in armor inside. Thersites made the girls stand in a large group to one side. From that viewpoint, Joan could see a bearded man seated on a bench, and everybody seemed to defer to him, at least outwardly. But she could sense discontent under the politeness.

A young man stepped forth. "Hail, Agamemnon, King of Men. I have a guest to present. He is Trojan, but he is also a priest of Apollo, which makes his person inviolate. May I bring him in, and have everybody's assurance that he will not be touched?"

"Very well, Achilles," said the bearded man, though he clearly did not like what was going on.

Achilles went out and brought in and old man, clad in a golden robe, maybe representing his role as a priest of the sun god.

"Father!" cried one of the girls in Joan's group. She started toward him but Thersites blocked her way.

"As she says, that is my daughter," said the priest. "She was captured two weeks ago. I came to Agamemnon, king of men" - he bowed, but it looked rather perfunctory - "to ask for her return, but the king refused me. On my way out of the camp, I ran into this young man," indicating Achilles "who told me that among the Greeks, a Council may override a King. So I have come to make a plea to the Council. Please, return my daughter to me, and I will praise all of you to the god."

The heroes formed what looked like a football huddle. The difference was that a football huddle was supposed to conceal information from the opposing team, and this one was clearly to shut out Agamemnon, king of men. As they broke up, Ajax said "Speak for us, Odysseus. You are good at it."

"We have decided," said Odysseus, "that dishonor to the priest of Apollo might inflame the god against us, which we do not need right now. Therefore, the girl must be returned."

The daughter looked overjoyed, and the girls seemed to be taking some vicarious joy in her release. But, Joan realized, the motive was utterly wrong. They were releasing her because keeping her might piss off Apollo, not because it is wrong to keep slaves.

"This creates a dilemma," said Agamemnon slowly. "On the one hand, we must keep the gods happy. On the other hand, it would be absurd for the King of Men to lack a maidservant when all lesser officers have one. Since you created this dilemma, Achilles, you shall solve it. You will surrender to me your own maidservant."

Bryseis screamed, and Joan could well see why. Achilles may treat her like a slave, but according to Bryseis herself he did not take advantage of her sexually. Agamemnon, on the other hand, would want to do so. If she resisted, she was likely to be raped. And in this culture, no one cared.

"This is disgusting!" Joan cried out. "Here you are, claiming that you are rescuing Helen, but you think nothing of stealing other girls and treating them like cattle . Is it just because Helen's a queen that she's so important, while ordinary girls are worth nothing? Or is Helen just an excuse? Is the real reason for the war to capture Troy? A big rich city that you lack the civilization to build yourselves? You are all a bunch of barbarians! And you- " she jabbed a finger at Agamemnon. "The womanfolk you boss around may just get fed up and decide to kill you some day."

"Seize that wench!" ordered Agamemnon. The other heroes needed no encouragement, they rushed at Joan so avidly that they got in each other's way. Joan tried to get out of the way, but tripped and fell-

- to the floor of her bookstore in Arcadia, Maryland.

TO BE CONTINUED

_(AUTHOR'S NOTE: None of the actions are really original with me. They are derived from the ILIAD, from various Greek legends surrounding the Trojan War, and from Shakespeare's TROILUS AND CRESSIDA. The "face that launched a thousand ships" line is by Shakespeare's contemporary, Christopher Marlowe.)_

_(AUTHOR'S NOTE: Joan's prophecy about Agamemnon comes true. After winning the Trojan War, he is murdered by his wife on his first day home. The story is dramatized in Aeschylus's AGAMEMNON, the first great tragedy ever written.)_


	3. Chapter 3

**Arms and the Girl**

**Chapter 3**

Grace Polk sat at her lunch table, her petition in front of her, awaiting all comers. But being Grace Polk, she didn't get many comers. She was even relieved when Glynis walked up.

"Hi," said Glynis. "I hear that you're organization a petition about a class. What's it about?"

"I don't think students should be forced to read the ILIAD. Too militaristic."

"Hmm, don't think I have much opinion about that. On the other hand, I hated it when one teacher made me read PRIDE AND PREJUDICE, so I empathize. Brainy girl, Lizzie, but she wasn't allowed to do anything with her life but get married. OK, I'll sign."

"Thanks," said Grace, tremendously relieved, but not wanting to show it. Now she finally had a signature other than her own.

Grace watched as Glynis walked toward the door of the lunchroom, and bumped into her boyfriend, Luke. She hoped they would not get gooey, and in fact they didn't. After a few exchanged words, Luke walked over to Grace's table.

"Hi, Grace. I heard you've come up with a petition setting out your objections against the Iliad. I guess I'll sign. We sub-defectives have to stick together."

"Thank you, but why do we have to stick together?"

"Because if we don't, I won't have anybody to talk to except my sister, and she's –"

"Um, I get your point. Thank you anyway."

Luke signed and went off, and a girl walked up, somebody Grace had never spoken to before, though she had spotted her in English class. "Hello. I hear you're circulating a petition about not reading the ILIAD."

"That's right."

"I'll sign. I don't think students should have to read pagan stuff. All those false gods and goddesses."

Grace hadn't even thought of that. She had heard that many devoutly religious people in the past loved Greek mythology, regarding it as literature and not as an affront to their beliefs. But she desperately needed more than 3 signatures. "OK. Please sign here."

The girl signed and walked off. A few minutes later, Friedmann showed up. "Hi. Glynis told me about your petition. I'm willing to sign, because I hope they'll accept Lord of the Rings as a substitute."

"But you've already read Lord of the Rings," Grace pointed out.

"Right. So I'll have lots of free time while everybody else is trudging through the Rings or the Iliad."

"Friedmann, you're gross."

"Do you want my signature or not?"

Grace sighed, "Okay. You're not gross. Just very irritating."

"I can live with that." He signed the form and went off to eat.

Five signatures now. Still not too impressive. Grace looked around for more potential signers, and then her heart sank, because the Girardi was walking up.

"I heard that you were getting up a petition about the Iliad," said the Girardi.

"Yeah. Will you sign?"

"Can we talk about this first?"

"If you like."

"I had a dream about the Iliad last night," said the Girardi. "I dreamed I was in the story – not as a hero, but as one of the captive woman. They were complete innocents, whose only crime was to cross paths with a lecherous "hero". And after ten years away from their queens, all of the heroes were pretty horny. Their only chance was if somebody back in Troy decided to ransom them, but the Trojans were more likely to write them off as damaged goods. The one who did try to rescue the girl was a father, not a lover who wanted a pure girl."

"Wow!" said Grace. "I hadn't thought through all that, but you're right. It's all the more reason why we shouldn't have to read about such as an oppressive society. So will you sign?"

"No. Because this isn't about the Greek heroes, this is about Homer. The reason we know about the horrible treatment of the girls is that Homer told us. He didn't call a lot of attention to it, and we don't know what Homer himself thought about it, but it's there. Compare that to Lord of the Rings. Were any of the heroes there brutal to woman, or to peasants like Thersites? No, Tolkien wouldn't let his heroes act that flawed."

"Now, we don't know why Homer was so frank about the oppression," the Girardi went on. "Maybe he secretly thought the heroes were a bunch of bullies, and sneaked in some examples while he was singing the epic to the aristocrats. Or maybe he was very honest in depicting what his society was like. I remember reading a kid's version of the Odyssey several years ago. It made like Odysseus was a big hero, but he did do some rotten things. Put that giant's eye out, and he only had one. Lost all his men, and didn't even bother to remember their names. Killed a lot of suitors, and for what? Eating his food and hassling his wife. And Homer tells us all that. Homer told us about his society, the origin of Greek culture, warts and all. So I think he's worth reading. Sorry, Grace, but I can't sign."

"I understand." The Girardi's arguments were intriguing. But what Grace couldn't understand is how the GIRARDI came up with all that. The girl was supposed to be a ditz, but she wasn't.

The Girardi went off, and Grace saw her talking to a cute boy whom Grace had seen before but didn't know the name of.

"So, did I come up with the right answer?" asked Joan, out of Grace's earshot.

"There is no right answer," replied Cute Boy God. "There is only the deeply considered answer, which you gave. As Socrates said a few centuries after the Trojan War, the unexamined life is not worth living."

"Thank you. But next time, do I have to examine life so closely? I mean, all those unwashed heroes STANK."

"It will become easier as you go along, Joan."

Meanwhile, unaware of the divine revelation going on just a few feet away, Grace looked at dismay at her petition. Just five signatures, and not one of them really represented agreement with Grace's point of view.

"Oh, hell. Maybe I should go ahead and read the damn Iliad!"

THE END


End file.
